2015KCBS NEWS

BBQ Tour Stop #15: Franklin, NC

August 26, 2010

After Wisconsin and the State Fair, we headed to Franklin, NC. This was the second year for the Mountain High BBQ and Music Festival and the second year that the KCBS BBQ Tour attended. Chris and I left Knoxville and headed south towards Franklin driving down the Great Smoky Mountain Expressway on I-40. Driving through the mountains always reminds us of the Ozarks and feels like home.

On Thursday night, the organizers treated the teams to a fantastic turkey dinner with all the “fixin’s”! Since it was held in the community center with air conditioning, the turnout was fantastic.

There were 52 teams competing which is a great number for a second year contest. The weather was hot, like most of the places that the tour has traveled to this year, but bearable. On Friday night, just as Chris and I were getting ready for our demonstration, the clouds came in and the rain started coming down. It was great to cool down the event but did not stop lightly coming down for most of the evening. As the sun set, a Jimmy Buffet tribute band played through the night as Chris and I spent some time visiting with some of the cook teams. This was one of the few events we caught up with Smoky Mountain Smokers, Big Mo from Aho, Tarheel Smokers, Bub-Ba-Q, Team Bobby-Q, Wild Bunch Butt Burners and the Swamp Boys.

Saturday turned out to be a beautiful day as people streamed onto the fairgrounds for the BBQ contest, great music and dozens of crafters. Our demonstrations had great crowds and we even prepped and smoked pork tenderloin so folks could get a BBQ sample before they headed over to the sold out BBQ tastings. The BBQTV folks were even out and taped one of our demos. Not sure they caught the old man in the back row giving me dirty looks for my “blue glove” comment, but I sure did and couldn’t help laughing so hard, I forgot what I was going to say.

At the end of the day, Old Dominion Smokehouse won Grand Champion while Tarheel Smokers took home Reserve Grand and Quau even made the long trip south from Illinois to take home the Kingsford prize.